The long-range goal of this application is to augment and strengthen the HIV/AIDS research capabilities of faculty and trainees at Meharry Medical College. The Meharry Center for Health Disparities Research in HIV (MCHDR) will create a research environment in which faculty and trainees will enhance their research skills, conduct high quality research, disseminate their research in peer-reviewed publications, and compete with greater success for independent extramural research funds. The programs proposed in this application will assist the institution in its mission to conduct research with a special emphasis on health disparities: diseases and conditions that disproportionately affect ethnic minority populations. The specific aims of the current application are: Phase I: 1) To recruit and employ an established, nationally recognized clinical scientist to serve as a focus to attract and develop other research faculty and to lead the Comprehensive Center for Disparities Research in HIV/AIDS at Meharry Medical College. 2) To enhance the scholarly environment for research in HIV/AIDS to ensure that the three subproject investigators in this application become fully independent scientists 3) To establish a sound administrative and scientific infrastructure for the growth of the center. 4) To renovate a physical site at Meharry Medical College for the Comprehensive Center for Disparities Research in HIV/AIDS. Phase II: 5) To recruit and employ three established investigators who study HIV or closely related subjects. 6) To increase the number of mainstream research project grants that fund HIV research at Meharry.7) To increase the number of Meharry Faculty with collaborative, extramural funding for research in HIV and AIDS. 8) To obtain funding for mainstream program project and institutional NRSA grants in HIV.9) To increase the number of peer-reviewed publications by HIV/AIDS investigators. The Meharry MCHDR is a consortium project involving Vanderbilt University and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. The proposed program consists of an administrative core and three collaborative research subprojects. The core provides administrative support for HIV/AIDS faculty with an emphasis on the collaborative projects. The core also includes a number of faculty recruitment and development activities including workhops on grant-writing and publication, workshops an HIV/AIDS seminar program and an annual regional HIV/AIDS symposium.